A journey through the exciting, pre-code cinema of 1929. It was a brackish time of both silents and talkies. And in the 9 months before the crash, it was still the Roaring Twenties. The whiplash of reactionary crackdown and censorship in the movies hadn't hit yet. So, you can see a lot more racy costumes, sexuality, intimacy, degradation, hedonism, violence, and mayhem that was left unpunished in the last reel. Not to mention, interracial romance, other "race mixing", and films about people of color that are fully formed, complicated characters, not just ugly stereotypes. All of those things would be forbidden by the Hayes Code. Watching pre-code pictures can give you a keyhole glimpse of what cinema might have been without the industry-imposed censorship regime.

This is a little amuse bouche of the pre-code films of 1929. They are all in the public domain and are available to watch for free. Sources listed below. Definitely check them out. All worth watching at least once.

Movies:

Music:

US Marine Band performing Rhapsody in Blue (Recorded in 2018, but in the public domain because it was performed by The United States Marine Band)